WHATEVER happens this season, it is crucial that as a club we learn lessons.

Why?

Because our decline has not just been taking place since relegation in 2001 - it has been going on for almost 20 years and, as the Sky Blue Army is heard to sing now and again: "We're not very good and we're sick of it!"

Of course, it's quite possible that we thrashed QPR 7-0 last night and that all our troubles are over.

Yet even if we did, there are fundamentals with regards to running a football club that have too often been transgressed over the last 18 years which have contributed significantly to our current sorry plight.

Number one: faith in the manager.

The revolving door on the manager's office at CCFC must require a can of WD40 every week, such is the rate at which it spins.

Only two of our last six managers have had the luxury of a full season to build and develop the team.

Is it any wonder we are where we are?

Of course, another went recently - sacked five days before a massive game against local rivals and nine days after overseeing a 4-0 victory.

Such time is bewildering and adds to the nation's perception of Coventry as a club that sacks managers on a whim.

Yet, depressingly, so familiar are managerial executions at City that the reaction seemed incredibly muted, as though a train had been delayed or the Government had lost a few more data discs. Ho hum.

Number two: We must hold on to our best players. This goes right back into the mists of time.

We can all name players who have been sold at the wrong moment, causing great damage to our prospects.

Often it seems as if there is a culture at City to do what suits other teams rather than ourselves.

The Australian cricket team are renowned for doing that which causes the opposition problems. It is just one reason why they are the best in the world.

We should do the same.

On balance it probably would have suited our purpose to keep Dele Adebola - even if that meant that he left for nothing at the end of the season.

His presence up front was influential and if we go down due in part to our lack of goals, the £250K (or what ever it was) we got from Bristol City will be small consolation.